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UNIVERSITY  ARCHIVES 


University  of  California  •  Berkeley 


1869-1917 
The  Center  of  University  Life  for  Fifty  Years. 


North   Hall   Farewell 

ALUMNI,  FACULTY,  MEMBERS^  GRADUATING  CLASS,  AND  FRIENDS 

OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  WILL  PARTICIPATE  IN 

A  CEREMONIAL  FAREWELL  TO  THE  HISTORIC 

BUILDING  FOLLOWING  THE 

Commencement  Luncheon 

THE  LUNCHEON  WILL  BE  HELD  IN  THE  FACULTY  GLADE 

IN  STRAWBERRY  CANYON  AT  12:30  P.M., 

ON  COMMENCEMENT  DAY 

Wednesday,    May    16,    1917 

The  usual  speakers'  programme  will  be  omitted.  After  the 
annual  business  meeting  of  the  California  Alumni  Association 
the  assemblage  will  form  in  procession,  and  led  by  the  band, 
will  march  through  the  Campus  to  North  Hall  Steps,  where 
the  farewell  ceremonies  will  be  conducted.  The  wreckers  will 
begin  the  destruction  and  the  pilgrimage  will  proceed  to 
Wheeler  Hall  where  a  reception  and  reunion  will  take  place. 


Annual   Meeting  of    Alumni   Association 

which  will  take  place  at  the  luncheon  will  consist  of  the 
election  of  officers  and  a  review  of  the  annual  reports. 

The  enclosed  luncheon  ticket  should  be  returned  at  once, 
accompanied  by  check  covering  same,  at  price  of  75  cents  a  plate. 

Special  reunions  will  ~be  held  by  the  Classes  of  1877,  1879,  1892, 
1897,  1901,  1907,  1912, 


MAY  14,  1931 


1UA I      1*,     ItftiJ. 

SLY  PR( 


V.  C.  North 
Hall  Corner 
Stone  Rites 
Recall  Past 


'Old    Grads'    Present 
Relics  of  1873  Are 
Brought  to  Life 


as 


BERKELEY,  May  14. — The  past 
has  come  to  lire  at  the  University 
of  California. 

Events  of  the  Eastbay  of  58 
years  ago  were  revealed  with 
examination  of  time-dimmed  news- 
papers and  records  unearthed  yes- 
terday in  the  cornerstone  of  old 
North  hall,  campus  building  re- 
cently wrecked. 

Opening  of  the  cornerstone  was 
an  informal,  merry  affeir  attend- 
ed-by  many  oi  tne  oldest  "grads" 
of  the  university,  some  of  the 
youngest  alumni,  and  President 
Robert  Gordon  Sproul  and  other 
university  officials.  It  was  a  feat- 
ure of  the  program  of  the  sixty- 
eight  commencement  day  of  the 
state  institution. 

Several  hundred  "old  grads"  and 
other  guests  held  their  breath  in 
anticipation  while  President  Sproul, 
dropping  all  official  dignity  and 
becoming  just  "Bob"  Sproul  of  the 
class  of  1913,  heaved  on  a  chain 
hoist  and  lifted  the  granite  block 
above  the  cornerstone. 

COPPER  BOX  REVEALED 

His  efforts  revealed  the  copper 
box  which  was  placed  In  the  build- 
ing on  May  3,  1873,  when  its  con- 


struction was  begun.  And  the  ef- 
forts of  Professor  Emeritus  Ed- 
mund O'Neill,  graduate  of  the 
class  of  1879  and  veteran  educator 
of  the  university,  revealed  the  con- 
tents of  the  box. 

His  chisfel  and  hammer  opened 
the  corner  stone,  and  there  were 
yellowed  newspapers,  pictures,  and 
university  registers  which  had  been 
put  there  when  Professor  O'Neill 
was  "Eddie,"  just  one  of  150  un- 
dergraduates on  the  then  isolated 
campus. 

In  the  box  were  more  than  a 
dozen  newspapers  of  May  3,  1873, 
a  "half  dime"  dated  1869,  a  medal- 
lion bearing  the  names  of  the  12 
members  of  the  class  of  1873,  uni- 
versity registers  of  1869,  '71  and 
'73,  and  several  undergraduate 
publications  of  that  day. 

The  biggest  laugh  the  watching 
crowd  had  was  when  Judge  Everett 
J.  Brown  of  Oakland,  graduate  in 
4897,  held  aloft  a  small  booklet 
taken  from  the  cornerstone  and 
announced  its  title,  "Rights  and  | 
Conditions  of  Women,  a  woman's 
suffrage  tract  containing  the  ser- 
mon of  the  Rev. Samuel  J.  May." 

Indian  battles  in  Modoc  county, 
the  death  of  Congressman  Brooks, 
a  Mississippi  tornado,  and  police 
court  and  Alameda  grand  jury  re- 
ports were  the  leading  stories  in 
the  newspapers. 

INDIAN    WAR   NEWS. 

Under  the  heading,  "This  Morn- 
ing's Dispatches,"  0:1^  n^v^paper 
told  "the  latest  from  Modoc  coun- 
ty," and  of  the  expected  arrival  of 
Gen.  Jeff  C.  Davis,  who  would  lead 
the  fight  against  the  Indians.  Clas- 
sified advertisements  on  page  one 
of  the  paper  included  those  of 
wine  and  liquor  stores,  portable  gas 
machines  for  sale,  and  one  that 
announced  that  the  advertiser 
would  "whiten  buildings." 

Another  story  told  of  the  trou- 
bles of  Constable  Enright  of  Liver- 
more,  who  walked  about  town  all 
night  "to  satisfy  the  whim"  of  his 
prisoner,  an  "inoffensive  man  who 
was  unfortunately  under  the  influ- 
ence of  liquor  at  the  time:"  Liver- 
more  had  no  "lock  up"  at  the  time, 
and  the  constable's  walk  was  to 
keep  the  prisoner  happy  while  he 
awaited  a  hearing  before  Justice 
Freeman,  the  story  said. 

Papers  in  the  corner  stone  In- 
cluded the  Daily  Alta  Californian, 
the  Oakland  Daily  Transcript,  The 
San  Francisco  Chronicle,  the  Daily 
Morning  Call,  the  Overland 
Monthlv.  which  "dealt  with  the 


•prnent   of    the    country,"    the 
•is;      Bulletin,      the      Oakland 
Home  Journal  and  Alameda  Coun- 
ty   Advertiser,    the    Oakland    Daily 
News  and  the  Evening  Torch 

Sale,  for  $25,000,  of  a  parcel  of 
land  to  George  O'Nara  Taaffee, 
Danish  consul,  was  announced  by 
Captain  J.  D.  Farwell  in  one  of  the 
papers.  The  land,  in  Alameda  near 
Park  street,  sold  at  $2400  an  acre, 
the  story  said. 

A  note  left  In  the  copper  box 
said  that  George  Miller  and  his 
family  had  a  "M.  E.  Sunday  school 
picnic"  on  the  site  of  North  hall 
the  day  the  corner  stone  "to  stand 
for  many  hundreds  of  years"  was 
laid. 

Professor  O'Neill.  In  an  address 
at  the  ceremony,  told  how  he  stood 
"in  trepidation  on  this  spr 
years  ago,  when  he  took  his  uni- 
versity entrance  examinations  in 
North  hall,  then  one  of  the  two 
buildings  on  the  campus. 

FEW    FARMS,    FACTORY. 
"Toward  Oakland  then,"  h^ 
"there  were  only  a  few  farms.  To- 
ward   the   bay   there   was   one   fac- 
tory, which  served  its  pu 
when    we    sent    freshmen    there    to 
seek    the    recorder.       And    around 
here    there    were    only    the    brown 
hills." 

The  age  of  North  hall  and  the 
vouth  of  President  Sproul,  n-- 

mphasized   by   Judge   Brown, 
ho    introduced    the    president    for 
his  address  at  the  exercises. 

"When  North  hall  was  sagging 
as  much  as  it  e\  -  I,  and 

when  its  walls  and  bannisters  bore 
as  many  carved  initials  as  they 
could  hold,  there  was  born  li 
Francisco  the  man  who  is  now 
president  of  the  University  of  Cali- 
"ornia,"  he  declared. 

Dr.  /Sproul,  in  his  address,  urged 
he  alumni  to  unite  in  support  of 
their  alma  mater.  Their  organized 
efforts,  he  said,  would  aid  in  the 
university  in  times  of  stress  such 
as  that  which  recently  occurred  in 
the  state  legislature. 

Other  leaders  at  the  exercises 
were  Sumner  Mering,  councilor  of 
the  Alumni  association;  Robert 
Sibley,  executive  manager  of  the 
association;  J.  C.  Rowell,  graduate 
4  and  librarian  emeritus  of 
the  university;  Theodore  Morgan, 
senior  class  president;  Stern  Alt- 
shuler  and  Ruth  Waldo,  retiring 
president  and  vice  president,  res- 
pectively, of  the  student  body. 


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Commencement 
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